If this flag is set, the boss of Angel Island Zone 1 will launch the customary three bombs before flying overhead across the arena. The difference with these bombs is that rather than self-destructing when the boss is defeated, they fall back down where they stand, which is a problem because their graphics might get overwritten in the meantime.
Two bosses exhibit behavior indistinguishable from the final game: the Hydrocity Zone 2 boss produces a spout without descending into the water, while the Marble Garden Zone 1 boss introduces the usual spiked cylinder object, as well as the slightly altered movement that goes along with it.
The final boss affected by the flag is the Launch Base Zone 2 boss, Beam Rocket. When this boss is defeated, a sprite with broken mappings suddenly attaches itself to the Egg Mobile, and as the ship flies horizontally across the screen, it leaves behind an invisible object which produces a bunch of explosions.
If any of this sounds familiar, that's because this is a very early version of Knuckles' end of level cutscene. The invisible exploding object is the bomb, and the sprite with the broken mappings is the bomb chute!
Unfortunately, no more of the cutscene seems to be implemented. The player will still remain in control, and the screen lock just won't vanish. You'll just be trapped, forever.
Speaking of attack patterns: I have observed that Gapsule tries to hit you a second time after a first attack, without the eyes blinking again, in sucession. Was this intended all along or is it just a bug? IIRC the miniboss tries to do this once or twice during the fight.
ReplyDeleteTFW they mapped the MGZ1 pillar but not the LBZ cutscene.
ReplyDeleteHaha, so Knuckles fighting Big Arm wasn't planned initially, it looks like. That's wild
ReplyDelete...oh, that last paragraph was subtle.
ReplyDeleteIf there is code for activating knux bosses on sonic 3 is there way to edit boss with hex editor to get that boss behavior activated while playing as Sonic/Tails?
ReplyDeleteUh yeah, like I say in the post, the bosses check if RAM $FA81 is set, so if you just do a search for $FFFFFA81 in the disassembly, you should be able to find all of the checks. In S&K, they are all replaced with Knuckles character checks.
DeleteI distinctly remember encountering this phenomena in 2013 when playing FBZ as Knuckles in 3C 0408 using the level select. The Act 2 boss was swinging really fast.
ReplyDelete